an engineer who loves polish, cats, typography, robots, and many, many other things

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I think a lot of my color photography problems stem from variations on blue. I thought it was awesome that Eurso Euro (I don’t need to link it again, do I?) photographed so beautifully. I now think it was luck. Specifically, I’m beginning to think that my camera just gets way overexcited about blues. It sees blue and just jumps up and down in its little… camera… space. Thing.

(You do all know that when I say “camera” I mean “iPhone”, right?)

Anyway, this is a sort of navyish blue, which my “camera” waaaay oversaturated. I got something closer to color-true by dropping the saturation enormously, hence the skin tone. (I mean, I know what color my skin is. I can just look. It’s nail polish I need want some record of.)

Pure Ice French Kiss:

Taken in an alley with rain coming down, because I’m trying to add somegrit and drama to this blog. (No I’m not. Alleys just come in rainy here.)

It’s blue, all righty. Yep. Sure is blue. I have a lot of blue polish, mostly from my long quest for a perfect indigo. Not this one. I just bought this one. I don’t know why.

I guess that’s why I have so much blue polish.

My capitalization of brand tags is inconsistent, and to fix it I have to edit posts individually. This does not please me at all. In fact I am quickly reaching “unacceptably annoyed” by formatting limitations imposed by Blogger! But any other blogging choice is a lot like work. Bah.

I did not choose to put these polishes together because they are both complete sentences with punctuation. I would have, but I only just noticed. Dumb sentences, sure, but better than [grabs a bottle at random] “Smush”.

This first one I kinda already knew would disappoint. It’s from the same collection as Eurso Euro (have I blithered on enough about that one yet?), and when I got EE in all its indigo perfection, I hoped the purple would be equally glorious. (Spoiler: it isn’t)

OPI Vant to Bite my Neck?:

These are both pretty color-accurate, because your human meat eyeball with its high dynamic range can see a lot more color depth at once. So the way-overexposed shot on the right that shows the purpliness is, in human eyeball terms, just another part of this polish’s “depth of color”. Stupid excellent meat eyeball.

Look, aubergine is a lovely color that is mostly black. Seriously, when your canvases are 1cm2, this is just… black. In direct sunlight(well “sunlight”) it’s… black. (Black with an excellent, long-lasting creme formula, because OPI.)

With hints of eggplant.

So, since I don’t actually really like this polish, I decided to try to spruce it up by doing something I know I dislike, which is adding a highly-contrasting glitter topper.

SOPI: Beam Me Up, Hottie!:

Left: what it actually looked like, which is, mysteriously polka-dotted nails. Right: They’re very holographic
polka dots! And I learned that a blurry picture actually captures the holo colors better. I learned this from
real bloggers with better cameras. Which I do not need one of. Because I don’t need another hobby.

It seemed like a good idea at the time. …no, no it didn’t. It seemed like something I could reach without dislodging this cat. So that’s like a good idea, kind of.

This is just a bottle full of silver holographic glitter hexes in a clear base. Seems like my kind of looking-futuristic thing, but the formula is such a total goddamned PITA. This is several layers, with much dabbing.*

So… all things being equal, total fail! I’ll probably keep Beam My Up Hottie! for use over silver, where its holographic awesomeness can blend and glitter distribution is less obvious. I kind of feel like McAubergine here is bound for a new home.

* (Basically what it sounds like – sort of “patting” the nail with the brush, pushing individual glitters (glits?**) around.)
** I am pretty sure an individual glitter is a glit

Occasionally I look at the little bin of things that are post-Project Wear-It, then at the burgeoning bin of things that are still waiting, and I make a little sad noise. Then I remember that it’s just nail polish for crying out loud, if it makes me sad it’s a stupid hobby.

Then I make a little sad noise.

I made lunch (and dinner) from scratch today! Chicken stew. But I was playing around, as I do when I have no-one else present to poison, and it’s… well. I should have made more instacurry. I would describe it as barely edible. So I am sad about that (and a little hungry)… which means I should show you nail polish! Yes. Yes it does.

Sinful Colors Aqua:

Pretty color! It’s not quite this… electric in person. However, sinceit was a horrid gray rainy day even by Seattle standards, I’ll take mybright colors where I find them. Even in misleading photographs.

This is so similar in the bottle to SC Gorgeous, when I find it I’ll show you. This is a very pretty blue-leaning aqua, and Gorgeous is a sliiiigghhtly green-leaning aqua.

But I had an ulterior motive, which was to provide a base for a polish that must be 15 years old minimum, about which the Internet knows nothing. (damn kids)

See this is actually a mix of beautiful blue and green bar glitter.* In the bottle it looks like some kind of jewel. But in person it looks.. well, aqua. Especially from more than 6 inches away. It’s pretty, especially in indoor light, but compared to the bottle it is disappointing.

What the bottle looks like; what the polish looks like with a little distance. Herethe bottle looks less exciting than in person, and my nails look more excitingand glowy. It’s the same damn polish, camera. What do you want from me.

Ah, well. Pretty is still a good thing. I vaguely recall doing roommate E’s nails with this over purple and liking the results, maybe after PWI I’ll try that.

(PS: Also: It may seem as though our living room floor is covered in random objects. In fact, they are cat toys. I don’t know what to tell you.)

* Bar glitter means “long thin glitter”. It tends to hang off the sides of your nails or stick straight up or otherwise be a pain.

I am amazingly wiped out. Walking to school yesterday, and back two hours later, necessitated a nap. Putting on nail polish seems like a chore. (Buying it, not so much, it seems.) I think I was all wired up on anticipation and adrenaline for my Job Interview, and now that it’s over, my strings have been cut, and I am tired.

I wasn’t that impressed with the Maybelline Color Show Brocades collection. (Too many words!) But I eventually picked one up, which led me to looking at swatches, which led to the inevitable purchase of…

Maybelline Emerald Elegance.

Big green glitter, smaller green glitter and teeny-tiny gold
and green glitter, and it was easier to find that out on the
internet than by looking at the actual polish, by the way

Rather truer color at half-dark, 5 minutes after previous picture.
Thanks Seattle! When I need “darkness” you are there for me

Two coats. Thick and gloopy as all hell, but not actually hard to work with. The addition of teeny gold glitter makes it lean towards a yellowish green.

I feel like “brocades” is surprisingly apt (especially given the history of cosmetic companies on this). These are glitter polishes, but not sparkly; they end up giving the sense of complexity and something-happening without being glittery or obvious about the mix of colors.

From six inches, anyway. Beyond that, they look “green”. This is the tragedy of fancy nail polish. Le Sigh.

Well, I was going to do Rimmel London Burgundy Flirt. But… here’s the thing. I just did UO Spiked Punch, and they’re the absolute same. Really. Same creme/jelly* formula, same effort, same final color. The interim color was a bit different, but who cares? I had originally convinced myself that RL BF was a teeny bit browner, but, you know… it’s not. So, they’re BOTH going in the PWI bin.

I will not insult your intelligence with additional pictures.

So instead I will talk about perfume again! (wheee)

First, and important, there are two formulations of this, old and new. This is important because it is true of MANY perfumes (and some other cosmetics). This is because of either IFRA requirements (suuuuch a useless link) or EU requirements; basically, both have the same aim, which is eliminating perfume constituents that people are allergic to.

As a hopelessly pan-allergic creature myself, I love it. I never ever ever want my perfume to interfere with someone’s ability to breathe. (This is also part of why I favor low-sillage** perfumes.) But, a number of pre-existing perfumes had to be reformulated to comply with one or the other, and how much they changed is extremely variable.

So, L’Occitane Neroli (bitter orange blossom).

Some eBay seller. Thanks dude and/or lady!

I have a sample of this, and I have no idea when it’s from (I got it second-hand). My best guess is that it’s the original: exactly what’s shown above, a beautiful deep red. The newer versions seem lighter, plus I haven’t seen a new one in a little box-let. The internet suggests that the pre- and post-reformulations are moderately different. Also it … kind of smells allergenic?†

Review: y’all. I hate it.

I mean I can admire things about it! It has personality! It’s interesting and not the same as a million other perfumes! It has novel notes and dry-down! Just… they’re kind of a bad idea? (On me.)

It’s a very unisex smell, but not in a very soapy way; bitter orange is strong, and it’s backed by strong, strong cedar and spice (I get cloves and coriander). Sounds like it would be up my alley, but… it’s chokingly strong. Like, after 20 minutes of a fairly mild spray, I couldn’t take it anymore. Washing it off led to a lingering neroli/spicey/mildly soapy smell, tolerable… but not good.

This is someone’s perfect perfume. Go, someone! (You can have my sample.)

* I really need to get on a domain-jargon post** reeeaaaallllyyyy † Look, it sounds pretty hippy-dippy. But when you’ve been this allergic for this long, you actually start to be able to smell when certain things are a bad idea. I’m not crazy.

Base coat (which is nice on its own, I mean, I wore it), is Sally Hansen Celeb City:

X

Left is daylight, right is indoor, cuticles are covered in silver. Not easy tophotograph! It’s no Push’n’Shove,* but it’s a perfectly nice metallic.

Pretty color, nice and even in two coats. It’s shiny but maayyybe the glitters are too coarse to call it a foil? Nah, foil. (I think I’m going to do a post on all these made-up domain specific words.)

Later, topped with Sinful Colors Queen of Beauty:

X

Do I need to say which is which? No, I do not. Because theindoor photos are always the ones where I’m in last-stage jaundice.

My camera haaaates this. It took a while to get two even borderline decent photos, I mean, for heaven’s sake. Go look at KittyPNB’s swatches if you care, she has an actual camera. 😛

But basically, it looks like little disco balls. Just straight-up silver glitter. This is 4 [!] coats. I doubt it would be opaque without Celeb City undies, but it was pretty at every stage.

As a side note… who comes up with these names? Some of them are nicely descriptive (Champagne Toast), some are just eh (like, Celeb City, once I see the polish I can make some connection), some of them are straight-up meaningless (Cassie, Hot Wired), and some of them are just weird and misleading (Pull Over is an orange-ish yellow). It’s like paint samples, which are also named by people tripping so hard they can taste colors.

# of clicks it took me to find this: 2.

So now we know what color surreality, quintessent..i…ality? .. and elegance are.

This is another topper-over-previous thing. It’s very convenient! Also, Mr. Fix-It gave me the plague a head cold, which doesn’t change what I have to do to get a job, so forgive me if postings are kind of short and uninspired. Really uninspired.

Over UO Spiked Punch, here’s Sally Hansen Rouge Rush:

Indirect daylight, not-daylight. In person it looks better at night.

These were disappointing to photograph. In person, especially at night, they have a sort of glimmering depth that I usually associate only with flakies. I mean, I’m really too casual a blogger to get a lightbox and a macro lens and suchlike nonsense, but I can see why people do.

The polish has several different shapes of glitter in very, very minor variations of color; I’m a little surprised by how much I like it. AFAICT, it’s: pale pink glitter shreds; pale red glitter shreds; and smallish fuschia hex glitter.

Captain Fix-It has had a nasty head cold all week (overlapping our time in Hawaii, ugh). I thought it was somewhat miraculous that I hadn’t caught it from him… until I woke up this morning midafternoon with a sore throat and fever. Sigh.

Last night my polish-interested friend N came over with a bunch of Julep she’d gotten on sale. We swatched them all, then I foisted a bunch of swaps off on her, and she gave me a couple of colors that suited me better than they did her. It was a very pointless, girly, relaxing interlude. Then, shockingly, I painted my nails.

Meet Urban Outfitters Spiked punch:

Indirect overcast lighting, dimmed to zombie chic

This was basically impossible to photograph. In real life it’s the deep, dark, true red of a well-aged Cabernet, leaning neither pink nor brown. My camera, however, insisted it was Bright Red. I darkened this picture until it was closer to color accurate, at the expense of making myself look like the undead.

It’s a very pretty color, although if my nails were ANY longer it wouldn’t work. (My very pale skin makes dark colors look garish and out of place in larger quantities.) It’s a crelly, so this was four coats. It looks deep and interesting, but it was a mild pain. Dries fast though.

Polish All the Nails just posted these amazing shots of her entire collection lined up. O.O If my casual x × y count is even close, this is roughly a thousand bottles, which makes me question my handwavey “about a thousand” bottles in my collection, like, a lot. I doubt I could cover a 7-foot table… or could I? People are notoriously terrible at estimating volume, coverage, etc… but I still think I only have a fraction of these.

Well, PWI should make it a lot clearer. (Yay, “science”!)

I was going to do a PWI on Wet-n-Wild Champagne Toast, as another possible interview polish, but I can’t help feeling like we have to wait for daylight swatches. I think it’s a product of my nighttime lighting and/or camera, but this very pretty polish makes me look like a boiled lobster.

Wet-n-Wild Champagne Toast at night:

Left: more cooking, right: marginally less cooking. To my eye this looks like alovely, suitable pale gold, but to the camera… not so good. Daylight shots tomorrow!

I can say… this is a lovely, but streaky, pale gold. It’s pretty sheer; this is 3-4 (fairly fast) coats. I don’t mind streaks, to be honest. In my opinion, without a macro lens or a nail obsession, nobody notices or cares.

But I’m looking forward to a daylight post. Current feeling is that this is pretty, but subtle-verging-on-unnoticeable… which is to say, an excellent interview polish.

Island Colors is a new-to-me brand, because Hawaii. Cheap, too! I love cheap. (Don’t look at me that way, I’m a student.) Unfortunately, most of the colors are something I already obviously have. They do have some shaped glitters that I found interesting; and let’s be honest, I’m not going to leave a completely new kind of nail polish alone.

I almost always put glitters over basically the same base color, and generally don’t like multicolor glitters. So I picked up the deep red Island Colors Old Lahina, and the lighter red Surfing Safari:

Which was actually a nice, smooth creme. 1 coat was pinkish, but the 2nd and 3rd settled down to a nice, deep, not-quite-berry red.

I then added Island Colors Surfing Safari:

Look! Stars! …yeah, I don’t see them either, although I swearthey’re in there. The red is brighter because this is daylight.

Obviously, this is when things went downhill. I like my glitters subtle, not invisible. Also, the stars were a pain; I had to fish them out one by one and blop them on the nail in a puddle of clear carrier. Sometimes, this process scraped the red off part of a star. I feel like working with loose glitter would have been easier, and that’s saying something.

But the main problem is the too-perfect match to the background color. So, when this PWI is over, I may try it on something else. In the meantime, I bought two more colors, because… well, because that’s the sort of thing I do, I guess. 🙂

Quick post because we’re leaving for Hawaii at… ugh… never mind it is so early. Sooo eaaarrrlyy. Although I guess I can’t bitch, because Hawaii?

So anyway! I wasn’t going to buy any of these Sally Hansen weirdnesses, because the swatches all looked terrible. But then I guess everyone agreed with me, because they were marked down (eventually) to about two dollars. I’m kind of weak, so I bought one, even though I kinda thought blog swatches of these looked like little bugs on your hands.

Sally Hansen Fuzzy Coat Tweedy:

Up close: bugz. Distance: better!

Once again, hooray for trying stuff! Macro shots: little bugs. But from any distance, it looks interestingly complex and kind of awesome.

Someone once pointed out to me that like 47%* of blog posts start with “So.” It’s like you’re coming in in the middle. As in, “So there we were, me and 25 soaking wet Japanese architects in my apartment… and I’m out of brie!”

So I try not to start my posts with So. Even though I am pretty sure it’s common because it is amazingly convenient and feels right?

Right, right, crisis, right…

So I’m reviewing this nice seafoam green color, shortly after I’ve consigned a couple of polishes to the Hall of Shame and/or swap-landia. And I think, well, it’s a nice polish I guess, looks like liquid paper, but… should I add it to the Swap tag? I mean, when am I going to reach for a seafoam green? When I rewear my 80s-styled 10th grade prom dress (hah)? Why should I own this?

Then (oh no slope) I think… when am I going to reach for many of these? Most of these? I have (total guess) probably a thousand bottles of nail polish. Probably 90%+ of those aren’t something where I’m going to be like, “Oh! This totally matches my graduation gown!” or whatever. I don’t do nail art really,** and how often is a friend going to say, “Ooo, can you paint my nails midlevel-seafoam-but-not-too-green?”†

And this very quickly comes down to: why do I need these?

I don’t.

I buy nail polish for clear reasons: (1) it makes me happy after a shitty day (2) for that, they are small and easy to store and cheap and calorie free (3) my husband doesn’t mind (see 2)

But why do I keep them?

Ultimately, I suppose, this is the truth of the dilemma. Why collect? I will never reach for my seafoam polish because I need it and nothing is like it — or at least, on average, that’s true for the vast majority of my little bottles. I’m not a professional cosmetics artist who needs breadth. I’m not even someone who can paint anything on her nails at any time (see upcoming rant again). Project Wear-It has really made me consider: why is this in my house.

My only answer: because I’m a collector. And what that means, ultimately, is that owning all of these things makes me happy. In and of itself. Having a zillion little glass bottles makes me feel like an alchemist. Or a wizard! I’ve actually written fiction about it.

This raises a few more questions for me, including some frequently visited ones about video games…†† but ultimately, see 1, 2, and 3 above. So I will keep it because I have it, and it makes me happy, and there’s no harm.

And, if I ever get to go to an n*10-year reunion prom… I’ll be ready. 😛* (this number is completely made up)** (Sticking your hands inside robots all day tends to discourage nails that aren’t teeny weeny nubbins)† (spoiler: not often)†† (huuuuge dork)

I actually put this on as a base for another polish (coming soon), but since it’s on I figured I might as well post it, especially as I’m not exactly dying to wear it a lot. Behold, two coats of Sinful Colors Tantalize.

So… it’s gray. Not a bad gray, mind, but I’m having trouble figuring out what about this is “tantalizing.” Maybe it’s because I like metallics and am generally kind of obsessed with shiny things, but I can’t describe this as appealing. Maybe if it was a creme, but the (very slight) shimmer just makes it look like a failed silver.

OTOH, I guess gray is sort of a basic thing to have around, and it’s not like it looks bad.

Another day, another green. I have a small mountain of teal polishes, which are woefully under-represented so far… actually, when Project Wear-It winds to a close, I’m excited about using this blog to do some graphs and analysis about this collection. (Still a dork.) I do have some limits on what I will comfortably wear to work, at least given meetings or talks, so that may be something of a selection function.

Babbling. Here. Polish.

Urban Outfitter Girrl Like You:

Outside. There was sun but I was avoiding it.

It’s a pretty color. Strange on me, but not, I think, terrible. Nice, easy to work with formula. But…

Hrm

…that’s gonna be a hard image to let go of.

(update: my beloved husband: “Should you buy some? To compare? …although it would probably cost more. And scrape off way sooner.” Still, good thought!)

I picked up Oyster because it seemed interesting in the bottle, a milky purplish-gray-fuschia iridescence. To really show off, that sort of color usually needs to be used over something dark, or it’s just transparent.

You can see a difference, if you look. Let’s Talk is a hair bluer, a hair more luminous, somehow more electrically purple (which is hard to catch in photos). But they’re pretty much dupes. There’s no universe in which I desperately need to own both.

So, keeping Let’s Talk, Buffy goes in the swap pile.

* I don’t know my polish collection this well. It’s just that I was excited about showing Let’s Talk to my mom, because it is so radioactively purple, so I remembered.

Yesterday sucked a lot. Today sucks. Tomorrow will suck. Eventually it will suck less.

Sephora (makeup store) sold “Sephora by OPI”, store-branded nail polish. Different bottles and different colors, but OPI quality. (They make really good nail polish. There’s at least one other “by OPI” brand out there). Past tense because the whole line has been discontinued, replaced by something in-house that costs $15 a bottle — not gonna happen… I’ll buy 2 or 3 OPIs or Essies instead. But, I did pick up a few bottles of SOPI on mega-clearance.

This is Sephora by OPI Indi-go With the Flow:

Meh picture, meh nails, meh polish.

It’s glitter, a sort of steel-blue glitter with larger and smaller glitters in a clear base. I put it over some random fairly-close blue, since I didn’t know how many coats it would take for full opacity.

It’s strange. I could totally like this? I like all the words in the description. But instead I don’t. It’s sort of meh without being work-appropriate, full of glitter without being sparkly. Not Hall of Shame appropriate, just… totally unexciting. I’m not throwing it in the swap pile for now, but… so much meh!

Even since before discovering the blue perfection that is Eurso Euro, I’ve been mildly obsessed with finding a similarly wonderful green. Every option I see is slightly, but noticeably, kelly green – which is to say, has a definite blue/teal component. I love kelly green! But I want is a beautiful, saturated, true emerald green.

So when I saw The Polishaholic’s swatches of Essie Going Incognito, I already knew it was kelly green. Her swatches are pretty much always spot-on and informative. But it was so close, and I wanted it to be green so badly, and Amazon (as always) was right there…

Essie Going Incognito:

See? A little too blue to be “true” green.

But good gravy it’s pretty.

Formula lovely, color as shown or darker in some lights, yada yada.

I’ve collected nail polish on and off for years. My husband can vouch for buying me holographic polish, what, 15 years ago. Heck, my parents can vouch for buying me polish. But what really kicked off the last 2-3 years of obsession is the $2 Sinful Colors polish, and all its more recent competitors. (“What? People don’t always like spending $10 for a cosmetic that might or might not work? What?!” Why is this idea novel you guys.)

My only point is that spending $8 for a not-quite-right green is a vote of confidence from me! I still haven’t decided to spend $20 + $10-15 shipping for Rescue Beauty Lounge’s Recycle(whimper but pretty whimper) even if it might be closer, so I’m still me.

Another day, another blue. I think I’m going to make a point of not wearing blue tomorrow. Unless I just keep this color on for another day, which would be fine with me, as it’s wonderful.

I went to Urban Outfitters last night to get a couple of 2/$8 polishes, and also to get out of the house and get moving. (Nail polish motivates me.) Aaaand they had a bunch of colors on fire sale, $0.99 a bottle. So I got six new polishes! …and a couple more for $8. (What can I say? I’m weak.)

Indirect sunlight. In indoor-only lighting it’s much more teal. Dang,I feel like if I swapped this and the physicians formula blue, they’d both be more color-accurate. do not need another hobby…

Why I haven’t seen more on the blogosphere about Urban Outfitters polish? I mean, yes, everybody wants in on the nail polish market right now. I wouldn’t be surprised if my insurance agent comes out with a line of nail polish. But UO has lots of colors, a reasonable price ($5, with various specials like 2/$8), and, in my experience, exceptional formulas. Am I missing something??

Update: I mentioned this to one of my (two) polish-interested friends, and she said, “Maybe it’s all that ripping off indy designers?” So I Googled ‘urban outfitters controversy’, and… yeah. Well, I’m not returning one-dolla polishes, but good to know. I guess. 🙁

I don’t like it when nail polishes don’t have a name. It breaks something in my little OCD heart not to be able to fill out a mental spreadsheet properly. I’m not particularly organized, so I have no idea why it bothers me, but it does.

Physicians Formula (no apostrophe) sells trios of unnamed minis. I bought “Trendsetter Chic“: dark blue, medium blue, and plummy purple. I bought the trio for the dark blue (before I found my beloved Eurso Euro), and was disappointed by it. So I didn’t have the highest hopes for the boring medium blue creme.

Physicians Formula Trendsetter Chic #2:

Bloooo!

Joke’s on me, and hooray for swatching! This turns out to be a beautiful polish! It’s a rich, saturated cornflower blue, which covered flawlessly in two easy coats.

Okay, so this photo is a mess. My polish is super lumpy (I was trying something (don’t ask)), and there’s nail polish on a lot of things that aren’t strictly my nails. But I don’t care, because (1) it’s pretty true to color, though the actual color is a bit dustier/whiter; and (2), pretty.

When I said I wanted Eurso Euro in every color, this is the medium-blue fulfillment of my wish. Yaaay!

I’m meeting with a visiting VIP today, meaning my nail polish has to be work-appropriate – which in my field just means “subtle” (I have a whole rant on that, but it can wait). I’d go without polish, except…

I recently switched back to PVA peel-off base coat. In the meantime, I had forgotten that water-based coats won’t block stains. (Lab Muffin gives an excellent explanation, as always.) I was reminded after a day of chartreuse polish turned my fingernails three-pack-a-day yellow overnight! doh.

It’s a tiny bit cooler and shinier than this shows. Indirect outdoor light.

It’s a foil; application is okay, definitely not a one-coater. The color is a pale, pretty gold, somewhere more in the champagne family. This is two coats; it would really have needed three for full opacity, but very short nails have their charms!

I’ve been looking for The Perfect Nude for a while; I’ve also had Sinful Colors Satin for a while, but every time I’ve gone to use it for something, I’ve ended up aborting its involvement for some reason. Well, when it’s the last time I’m going to wear something for a really long time, I’m going to try hard to make it work! And so I learn: sometimes I can’t.

It’s very sheer. It’s really, really not self-leveling. This is five coats. It’s… look, better bloggers than I have had great success. In/on my inexpert hands, however, it was a lumpy, uncooperative catastrophe. I tried putting it over white; then it was a lumpy, uncooperative, white-ish catastrophe. Plus – insult to injury – it’s too yellow for my skin.

So for the sake of completeness, here’s the first Hall of Shame entry: Sinful Colors Satin.

I really tried, though?

The Hall of Shame here probably refers to me, rather than the polish, dunno. Nonetheless. I won’t cry about not wearing this one for a while, because I’m never wearing it again. Want it? I’ll mail it to you postage-paid, but it can’t stay here.

This is an older picture, but I think it still makes sense to continue plowing through Project Wear-It, even though committing to not wearing it for a while makes me cry a little inside. Here we go with OPI Eurso Euro from the Europe Centrale collection:

It doesn’t even matter that my photo is bad when the polish is so freaking gorgeous. Direct, overcast sunlight.

This is one of only two polishes that I have a (deliberate) backup of. I cannot get over how much I love this color. It’s a very saturated, intense, blue-leaning indigo*; not only is it just so freaking beautiful, but oddly, it actually manages to look professional! Ish. I mean, for blue. But mmmm so lovely.

I want a polish with this level of saturation and purity in every possible color. Please?

The blogosphere seems to have developed something of a love-hate relationship with OPI’s limited edition Gwen Stefani polish Push and Shove. As an affirmed geek, it should be no surprise that I want mirror nails badly. (I want to look like I’m from the future! Is that so wrong?)

It is, as many others have said, super fussy. Especially, I tend to do a lot of light strokes, and this drags so badly. But I persevered, trying a few combinations, and the smoothest, shiniest look I got was pretty exciting!

A couple of pictures, both in indirect (and overcast) daylight. This was after dinner and sleep, and they’re a little dinged up, but definitely still wearable. (No, I do not take great photos or do cleanup particularly well, it’s true. Life goes on.)

The combination that worked for me was:

DIY peel-off base coat

Regular base coat*

Lay down the Base base coat (included with the polish)

One thick, unfussed-with layer of the shiny (two thick strokes for thumbs)

Patience

I couldn’t get Seche Vite to work as an underlayer, although many people have had good luck. I bet using it for Step 2 would work, though. I did find that top coat dulled it; only a tiny bit, but still.

* I used Sinful Colors Base Coat. Then I put it in a pile to get rid of, because it reeks. Bleah!

Project Wear-It was inspired by The Crumpet‘s apt observation that we tend not to wear the polishes we’ve had for a long time (original post here). However, unlike all the actual organized bloggers out there, I haven’t the first idea what I’ve worn or when I got anything. I mean, I can say “Oh, this one must be from about five years ago,” but that’s about it. Plus, even though I try not to, I’m pretty sure I re-wear a few polishes colors a lot and neglect others.

So I’m starting this blog to chronicle Project Wear-It, in which I am going to go through my entire polish collection and wear every single thing. To make this work, I am not going to re-wear any polish until the whole thing is over. (It feels like such a commitment!)

Obviously there will be exceptions, if I’m particularly inspired, or have a job interview, or have the perfect polish for a special night out, or whatever. But for the day to day what-shall-I-grab question, the answer for a while is going to be: Always something new.